Ferniehirst
CastleChapter III -
Family History
An outline history of the Kerrs of Ferniehirst

There have been Kerrs or
Kers (the older spelling) in the Borders since the end of the twelfth
century and possibly earlier. The origins of the family have long been
the subject of argument, along with the meaning of the name itself. The
principal theories are:

1. A Norwegian origin: "Kjarr"
signifying a "copse" or "small wood".
2. An ancient British origin: "Caer" is the Welsh for
"fort", found in Carlisle and in several S.W. Scottish
place-names, e.g. Caerlaverock.
3. A Gaelic origin, from the word for "left-handed". (Céarr).

The Gaelic theory may safely be
discarded as the language was never spoken in Kerr territory, and the
Gaelic word for "left-handed" most probably derives from the
well-known family trait (see p. 36). The British theory is just
credible, as Welsh was spoken in Upper Tweeddale, where the family first
surfaced in Scotland, until late in the eleventh century or early in the
twelfth: further west, it survived even later, and the Wallaces of
Elderslie, taking their name from the language, may have spoken it until
just before the Wars of Independence (1296-1328). But family tradition
is firmly in favour of the Norse theory, which is supported by the
presence of "Kjaers" and "Kjarrs" in the area around
Stavanger (our original home) as well as Karrs near St Malo and Carrs in
mid-Lancashire (the next two stages on our journey to the Borders).

According to this theory, our
remote forebears left Southern Norway with RoIf the Ganger — or Rollo
the Walker — thus called because he was too tall and long-legged to
ride, and therefore strode ahead of his berserkers on their ponies. They
settled in the angle of Brittany and the Cherbourg peninsula in 911,
then came to England in 1066 in the retinue of de Bruys, the ancestor of
the Bruces. He took up land near Preston and they received their small
share of it as his gamekeepers, an occupation also followed by John Ker
of Stobo four generations later (the "Hunter of Swynhope" and
the first recorded Scotsman to bear our name; he is mentioned as taking
part in a rough-and-ready land survey, or "perambulation", in
1190). One of his sons held land at Eliston in 1230 or thereabouts, and
other members of the family are recorded in Selkirkshire a generation or
two later, among them Nicol Kerr, who signed the Ragman Roll (a list of
Scottish landowners doing homage to Edward I) in 1296. From the
fourteenth century onwards Kerrs, variously spelt, are numerous in the
Borders, holding land at Altonburn, Crailing, Kersheugh (less than a
mile from Ferniehirst) and several other places, one of them being
Sheriff of Roxburgh towards the end of the fourteenth century, while
others are found in Ayrshire, Stirlingshire and elsewhere.

Jedforest (the upper valley of the Jed)
became Kerr property in 1457 when Andrew Kerr, the originator of our
left-handed tradition (see p. 36) obtained it from the Earl of Angus in
return for becoming the Earl’s "man" or vassal. Ferniehirst,
or rather the ground on which it stands, already seems to have belonged
to another Kerr, Thomas of Kersheugh, whose daughter and heiress,
Margaret, married her kinsman Thomas Kerr of Smailholm, younger son of
Andrew Kerr, mentioned above. From then on the younger Thomas (of
Smailholm) described himself as "of Ferniehirst". He was
knighted and built the original Ferniehirst Castle (most probably on or
near the site of an earlier "peel tower") in or about 1470: it
was destroyed and rebuilt several times but the present castle, dating
from the end of the sixteenth century, incorporates some of the original
structure and much of the original stone.

A dispute as to seniority between the two
main branches of the family, Ferniehirst and Cessford, began about this
time. It occasionally degenerated into a feud, but did not prevent quite
frequent intermarriage. It is difficult to be Impartial about this, but
the following points should be borne in mind:

1. While Sir Thomas Kerr of Ferniehirst
was the younger brother of Walter Ker of Cessford, he inherited the
land, on which he built the castle, through his marriage to Margaret Ker
of Kersheugh and Ferniehirst. Their son "Dand" Kerr (see
below) thus continued the Kersheugh line, and the family had in fact
been established at Kersheugh longer than at Cessford.

2. In any event, the Cessford line ended
with two daughters, one of whom married the head of the Ferniehirst
Kerrs. The Duke of Roxburghe, heir to the Cessford Kers, is descended
from the younger daughter and bears the double-barrelled surname of
Innes-Ker, The first Ker to own the former lands of Kelso Abbey was
Robert Ker of Cessford who was strongly attached to King James VI and
was knighted by him. He was a Gentleman of the Bedchamber and
accompanied James on his journey south to be crowned James I of England.
He was created Lord Ker of Cessford and Earl of Roxburgh in 1616 with
remainder to his heirs male. By his first wife he had but one son who
died young and two daughters, the elder of whom married the 2nd Earl of
Perth. By his second marriage he had another son, Harry Lord Ker, who
also pre-deceased his father leaving three daughters, one married to Sir
William Drummond, another to the Earl of Wigtoun and the youngest to Sir
James Innes of that Ilk, 3rd Baronet.

Sir Thomas Kerr of Ferniehirst (and
originally of Smailholm) is mainly known to history through his
involvement in several lawsuits. He died before his wife, the heiress of
Kersheugh and Ferniehirst, and was the father of Sir Andrew (‘Dand’)
Kerr of Ferniehirst (see below) as well as Thomas Kerr, Abbot of Kelso
and several other children.

"Dand" Kerr (1470-1545)
was one of the great Border "characters" of his time, with a
long and turbulent career. At one stage he was fined and imprisoned,
though the offence is not known, but only the fact that this fine was
later remitted. He acquired, in two stages, the lands and Barony of
Oxnam, and thus qualified to sit in the Scottish Parliament held a few
days before the battle of Flodden. Though the battle, taken as a whole,
was one of the worst disasters ever suffered by Scotland, the Borderers
won their share of it, but the King was dead and the greater part of his
army slaughtered before they returned to the scene. Lord Home, their
leader, then brought what was left of it back to Edinburgh: "Dand",
who had been involved in the successful part of the action, seized Kelso
Abbey the same evening and installed his brother Thomas as Abbot. This
was widely seen as a piece of shameless nepotism, but it is likely
enough that if Sir Andrew and his brother had not got there first,
someone else would — most probably the English.

A few years later, one of Sir Andrew’s
friends fought a pitched battle, "The Raid of Jedwood Forest"
with his kinsman, Walter Ker of Cessford, who was then Warden of the
Middle March — the issue being "Dand’s" right to hold
court in the Forest, and thus to profit from any fines levied there. In
1523 his castle, Ferniehirst, was taken by a large English force under
the Earl of Surrey (the victor of Flodden) and Lord Dacre; but several
hundred of Dacre’s horses were stampeded at night by the Kerr women.
"Dand" continued to hold the Ferniehirst title, acquired other
lands to make up for his loss and took his turn as Warden of the Middle
March and Provost of Jedburgh, as did several of his descendants. The
Wardenship generally alternated between Ferniehirst and Cessford, until
it was abolished by James VI following the Union of the Crowns; the
Provostship was held by Ferniehirst or by members of other local
families: at the last Border Battle, commemorated in the annual
Redeswire Ride and ceremony on the first Saturday in July, Ferniehirst
was Warden (but represented by his Depute) and Rutherford was Provost:
the Warden on the other side was Sir John Forster, already 75, who died
aged over 100, a few months before his Queen.

Ferniehirst was recaptured in 1548, a few
years after Dand’s death, by his son Sir John Kerr, with some
assistance from a French "task force" under the Sieur d’Esse.
The English governor of the castle and his men had committed unspeakable
atrocities in the neighbourhood, and many tried to save themselves by
surrendering to the French rather than the Scots, but the latter, after
slaughtering their own prisoners, "bought" the others from
their allies, trading in valuable horses and weapons for the purpose,
and killed them as well, afterwards playing handball with the Englishmen’s
severed heads. This is commemorated by the annual "Ba’
Game", in which the leather "ba’ " represents an
Englishman’s head and streamers attached to it at the start — but
soon lost in the general scramble — are supposed to be the Englishman’s
hair. It is further commemorated by the Ferniehirst Ride and ceremony,
the centre-piece of the Jethart Festival. Sir John later sat in the
Scottish Parliament and was one of the authors of a letter urging
Elizabeth of England to marry the Earl of Arran. (Many other suitors
were put forward, by various interests: they included the King of Spain
and several French princes, but she preferred to keep them all guessing
and to rule her own kingdom without anyone else telling her what to do.)
Sir John’s brother Robert of Ancram, was the ancestor of the Earls of
Ancram and of the Marquesses of Lothian (see p. 29), to whom the
Ferniehirst title passed when the direct line of descent from Sir John
died out in the seventeenth century.

Sir
John’s son, Sir Thomas Kerr of Ferniehirst, was noted for his loyalty
to Mary Queen of Scots, for whom he built a fortified house in the
centre of Jedburgh. He raised the Royal Standard for her in Dumfries,
helping her and her husband Darnley to put down an insurrection by a
group of her nobles (she won at the time but was forced into exile a few
years later). Subsequently he sheltered her English supporters after the
rising of the Northern Earls (1568) and rescued Lady Northumberland,
stranded by illness in a Liddesdale outlaw’s hide-out. He helped his
father-in-law, Kirkcaldy of Grange, to defend Edinburgh Castle in the
Queen’s name; when it was taken he lost precious family documents
which were never seen again, but at least he escaped with his life
(Kirkcaldy was beheaded) and fled abroad for some years. He was
re-instated in his lands by James VI when the young King came of age and
took power into his own hands. The townsmen of Jedburgh supported the
Regent Morton (later also beheaded) against Mary; they
"debagged" and publicly caned a herald sent out by Ferniehirst
to read out a proclamation of loyalty to the Queen, also compelling him
to eat his document.

From her English prison, Mary wrote to
Sir Thomas, thanking him for his past services and encouraging him to
keep up his loyalty. She seems to have taken a particular liking to his
young son Andrew, the first Lord Jedburgh, and may have knighted him
while still a child, for she asks in particular to be remembered to
"Sir Andrew".

Briefly imprisoned after the fall of
Edinburgh Castle, Sir Thomas was in exile and unable to perform his
duties as Warden at the time of the last major clash on the Border, the
Raid of Redeswire. This incident developed on one of the "days of
truce" when the Wardens or their deputes met to resolve various
local problems and to exchange or hang wanted criminals. On this
occasion the English Warden complained that the Scots had failed to hand
over a thief known as "Farnstein" (not a German refugee or
mercenary, as one might think, but an Englishman whose real name was
Robson). This led to mutual insults, no doubt aggravated by the fact
that both sides had been liquidating a great deal of liquid. The
argument grew into a scuffle and the scuffle grew into a fight.
Eventually the Jedburgh men arrived in strength and dispersed the
English, killing a few and capturing others, who were later released
without ransom.

Though he missed this particular
incident, Sir Thomas was involved in a similar but smaller affray, on
almost the same spot, ten years later. By then he was back in office as
Warden of the Middle March; Forster, now 84, was still in charge on the
other side, and Forster’s son-in-law, who was also a son of the Earl
of Bedford, was killed. Elizabeth Tudor was not amused, and insisted on
Ferniehirst’s punishment, though the rights and wrongs of the whole
affair were by no means clear. Being anxious to succeed to the English
throne, James VI sought to ingratiate himself with her, and exiled Sir
Thomas to Aberdeen, where he died within a year. The inscription on his
memorial in Jedburgh Abbey reads "Sir THOMAS KERR of Fernyherst,
Warden of the Marches, Provost of Edinburgh and Jedburgh, Father of
Andrew Lord Jedburgh, Sir James Kerr of Creylin (Crailing) and Robert
Earl of Somerset. He died at Aberdeen on March 31, 1586 and lies buried
before the Communion Table. He was a man of action and perfit loyaltie
and constancie to Queen Marie in all her troubles. He suffered 14 years’
banishment besides forfaulter (forfeiture) of his lands. He was restored
to his estates and honours by King James the Sext."

Sir
Thomas married twice. His children by his first wife, Janet Kirkcaldy,
included Sir Andrew of Ferniehirst, first Lord Jedburgh (see below) and
William, who took the name of Kirkcaldy to continue his mother’s line;
his children, however, reverted to Kerr, having failed to inherit the
Grange property. By his second marriage, to Janet Scott, Sir Thomas was
the father of Sir James Kerr of Crailing (father of the second Lord
Jedburgh) and of Robert Can, Earl of Somerset (see below). He had
several other children by both his wives.

Border warfare having died down after
Redeswire (though there was a final flare-up on the West March, the
"Ill Week" of 1603), Sir Andrew Kerr rebuilt Ferniehirst in
1598. It had been largely destroyed by the English allies of Mary’s
Scottish enemies, following on Sir Thomas’s support for the Northern
Earls in 1569 and a Scottish invasion of the English Middle March in
1570. Despite extensive restoration towards the end of the 19th Century,
the Castle now is essentially Ferniehirst as rebuilt by Sir Andrew,
though some parts (The Chambers and Cellars) date back to 1470 or
thereabouts.

Sir Andrew was Provost of Jedburgh for
many years, but never became Warden, the office having been abolished
following on the Union of the Crowns. He held several Court and
administrative posts, and was created Lord Jedburgh in 1622. His
half-brother Robert Carr (who adopted the English spelling of the name
when he migrated to England with the King) was James’ favourite and
possibly the best-known member of the family to those who have only a
superficial knowledge of English history, and none of Scottish history.
This he achieved by contributing to James’ personal unpopularity in
his new Kingdom, and to the tension that gradually built up against the
Stuarts, culminating in the Civil War and the "execution" of
Charles I. School textbooks, however, have been less than fair to him,
and grossly unfair to James VI and I — a competent ruler of his own
original kingdom even if he did not understand England well enough to be
a real success there, and a man of great intellectual ability.

First
a page and then a Groom of the Bedchamber, Robert Can was sent to France
by the King to improve his education. He was injured while dismounting
at a tournament, soon after his return to England; the King ordered him
to be lodged at Court while he recovered and visited him frequently; it
was at this time that he became the royal favourite, rather than
one of several bright young men in the King’s entourage. Thereafter he
accumulated offices and influence, to the great disgust of Englishmen
who felt these good things should have come to them instead. Soon
after being created Earl of Somerset (1613) he married Lady Frances
Howard, daughter of the Earl of Suffolk; but royal favour did not last
much longer, the Somersets being jointly tried for the murder of Sir
Thomas Overbury, sentenced to death, but reprieved and released, then
pardoned within a few years. The evidence against them was by no means
conclusive, and may well have been fabricated by personal enemies. They
had one daughter, Anne, who married Lord Russell, later Earl and then
first Duke of Bedford.

The second Lord Jedburgh, as we have
seen, was the half-brother of the, first: his son was the third holder
of the title, which then passed to the Ancram branch of the family,
descended from Robert Ken of Woodhead and Ancrum, second surviving son
of "Dand" Ken. This branch included, in the seventeenth
century, two remarkable men, Robert, first Earl of Ancram (1578-1654)
and his son William, who was created third Earl of Lothian, on his
marriage to the Countess of Lothian in her own right (see p. 30) and
succeeded to the Ancram title on his father’s death. They took
opposite sides in the Civil War, as did the Verneys in England (the
father being a Royalist in both cases) but this did not cause any
personal ill-feeling between them, and they remained close in spite of
politics.

Robert, Earl of Ancram, was the
great-grandson of "Dand" Kerr, grandson of Robert of Woodheid
and Ancram, and son of William Kerr of Woodhead and Ancram, murdered in
1590 by his cousin Cessford (later Earl of Roxburghe), at the
instigation of Lady Cessford, his mother (they had been in dispute about
who should be responsible for the interests of young Andrew Kerr, later
the first Lord Jedburgh; though Sir Andrew had by now come of age, the
bitterness remained). Robert thus became head of his branch of the
family at the age of 12, retaining this position for sixty-five years.
Cessford fled, and had to make ample compensation to Robert before he
could return home. These added resources enabled Robert to spend some
years in study, most probably abroad; he then returned to the Borders
and briefly held the office of Provost of Jedburgh. He followed King
James to England, as did his cousin Robert Carr (later Earl of Somerset)
and took up a post in the household of Henry, Prince of Wales, went
abroad again, then returned to a higher position in Prince Henry’s
household, being simultaneously Captain of the King’s Guard and
spending most of his time in Scotland, where he made various
improvements to Ancrum House, originally built by his grandfather. When
Prince Henry died, Robert was appointed "Gentleman of the
Bedchamber" (senior personal attendant) to Prince Charles,
afterwards Charles I. The Captaincy of the Guard then passed to Andrew
Kerr of Oxnam, son of Sir Andrew Kerr of Ferniehirst, while Robert
returned to England. He was involved in a duel with Charles Maxwell (who
had deliberately picked a quarrel with him in the hope of pleasing the
Duke of Buckingham) and killed his man, for which he was tried at the
Cambridge Assizes and found guilty of manslaughter. King James pardoned
him, however, Maxwell being a known and inveterate troublemaker, but
Prince Charles decided it would be better for him to leave the country
for six months. He was then fully restored to favour, and accompanied
Charles (and Buckingham with whom he must evidently have been
reconciled) on a semi-secret visit to Madrid. The object of the exercise
was to win a Spanish bride for Charles, and they did it in true Spanish
style, serenading the Infanta with their guitars, but to no avail.
Charles probably realised, in due course, that the Spanish marriage
would have been a mistake, not to say a disaster, and did not hold this
failure against his friends; soon afterwards Robert was given part of
the Lothian estates, which had fallen to the King when the second Earl
of Lothian died without sons and heavily in debt: Lothian’s daughter,
who had inherited the title and the rest of the property, later married
Robert’s eldest son William. Charles succeeded his father as King a
few months later and Sir Robert, who had been knighted about 1606,
became one of the most important men at Court though relatively
inconspicuous — being mainly concerned with advising the King on
Scottish affairs and on Court appointments, rather than in helping him
to hold his own against successive Parliaments or govern England without
them.

Sir William having become Earl of Lothian
in 1630, it was inappropriate that the son should be an Earl while his
father was only a knight, and Sir Robert was raised to the same dignity
in 1633, as Earl of Ancram, on the occasion of Charles’ Scottish
coronation. He began to have serious financial problems, however, having
spent a great deal on improvements to Ancrum House before handing it
over to his son, who was now on opposite sides politically, being one of
the leaders of the Covenanting party, who resisted Charles’ attempts
to establish the English form of worship in Scotland. Ancram and Lothian
now seldom met, as the father was now more or less permanently resident
in London and the son in Scotland; one of the rare occasions was in
1643, when Lothian passed through on his way to France, after a
short-lived agreement had been negotiated between the Covenanters and
the King. It did not last long, however, and Charles arrested the
younger Earl on his way back through Oxford; his father then had
considerable trouble in getting him released.

After the judicial murder of Charles I,
Ancram returned to Scotland for some months and then, when there
appeared to be no prospect of a Stuart restoration in the meantime, he
retired to Holland. The House of Lords having been abolished, he could
no longer claim privilege of Parliament against his creditors, and in
any event he did not care to live under the régime that had killed his
King and his friend. He was consoled by frequent visits to and from his
grandsons, Lord Lothian’s sons, who were studying in Leyden while he
spent his last years in Amsterdam; but advised their father to take them
away, as they had learnt all they were likely to learn there, and were
in constant danger of catching "a cruel ague or fever" due to
the damp climate. When Lothian took his advice, however, the loneliness
became too much for him, and he died within a few weeks.

As we have seen, Robert’s son, the
third Earl of Lothian, recombined the Cessford and Ferniehirst lines
through his marriage to the Countess of Lothian. Her great-grandfather,
Mark Ker, of the Cessford branch of the family, had been Abbot of
Newbattle at the Reformation. He followed the new religion and took the
Abbey out of the Church’s hands, becoming its Commendator as did
several other holders of Church property at the time. His son succeeded
him as Commendator and was later created the first Earl of Lothian. The
first Earl was succeeded by his son, but he only left two daughters, the
elder becoming Countess in her own right. However, she got very little
in practice except the title itself. Part of the Lothian estates could
only go to male heirs, and therefore, escheated to the King, who made it
over to Robert Kerr of Ancram, as we have seen, while most of her share
was seized by her late father’s creditors, but redeemed by Ancram, her
father-in-law. The third Earl, her husband, was one of the leaders of
the Covenanting party, but went to London to protest against the "frial"
and judicial murder of the King. He was sent back to Scotland under
escort. His son Robert, the fourth Earl, was one of those who invited
William of Orange to take over the two kingdoms. He was raised to the
rank of Marquis and died a few years before the Treaty of Union which
his eldest son, the second Marquis, strongly supported. Another son,
Lord Mark Kerr, had a long military career (sixty years of actual
service), rising to be a general, as did the 4th Marquis, Lord Mark’s
great-nephew. The title of Lord Jedburgh and the lairdship of
Ferniehirst passed to the fourth Earl of Lothian (later first Marquis)
when the third Lord Jedburgh (sometimes described as second Lord
Jedburgh as his father apparently did not use the title) died childless
in 1692.

Thereafter the "Jedburgh" title was
normally used as a subsidiary title by the Marquis of Lothian, while
that of Earl of Ancram has normally been used, at any given time, by the
Marquis’s heir, often sitting in the House of Commons while his father
sat in the Lords (as is now the case). The sixth Marquis of Lothian,
while Earl of Ancram in his father’s lifetime, lived at Ferniehirst
and is the last recorded member of the family to have done so. Another
Earl of Ancram, who did not live to take up the Lothian title (he was
killed in a shooting accident in Australia, 1895) spent a great deal of
money on restoring Ferniehirst towards the end of the nineteenth
century, and it seems clear that he envisaged living there, but the work
was interrupted on his death. Apart from recent work (see p. 7) the
general appearance of Ferniehirst is very much as he left it.

The sixth Marquis also erected the
Waterloo Monument at Penielheugh, on the ridge between the Teviot and
the Tweed a few miles north of Jedburgh. Bonfires are lit there on
important public and family occasions.

The seventh and eighth Marquesses
both died at a comparatively early age; culling off the promise of
brilliant public careers. Schomberg, ninth Marquis of Lothian, became
Secretary of State for Scotland; his nephew Philip, the eleventh
Marquis, was a member of Milner’s group of talented young
administrators in South Africa after the Boer War; known as the
Kindergarten". He later served as Secretary to Lloyd George and
helped to draft the Treaty of Versailles, and died as British Ambassador
in Washington during World War II. He was succeeded by his cousin, the
12th Marquis (a descendant of the 7th). Peter Lothian and his son
Michael Ancram have both held Ministerial appointments in Conservative
Governments (as did Schomberg, the 9th Marquis, whereas the 11th was a
lifelong Liberal) thus continuing the tradition of public service begun
when Ferniehirst Castle was built. Michael Ancram, at the beginning of
his Political career, is Under-Secretary of State, Scottish Office, and
Lord Lothian, having been Under-Secretary of State, Foreign Office,
ended his career in public service as Lord Warden of the Duchy of
Cornwall for the Prince of Wales.

FOOTNOTES

1 .One of the Ayrshire Kerrs
was a close friend and companion of Sir William Wallace, and was killed trying
to save him from arrest at Robroyston.

2.The most usual spellings in
Scotland are Kerr and Ker, the former acknowledging Lothian as their Chief,
and the others Roxburghe, but Keir, Carr and Carre are other versions of the
name The spelling Can is frequent among English bearers of the name, whether
they came direct from the original "centre of dispersal" near
Preston, or "re-migrated" to Northumbria and other areas from
Scotland. Among well known "re-migrants" are Sir Robert Can (or
Kerr), later Earl of Somerset (see p. 27) and another Sir Robert Can
(with the English spelling only) who helped to capture New Amsterdam from the
Dutch and renamed it New York. There are also three different pronunciations:
the historically correct one, on the basis of Norwegian descent (Kjan) is
identical with "car": it is now mainly used by Englishmen, by the
Scottish aristocracy and by many who emigrated to America, especially those
who went there at an early date. The usual pronunciation in Scotland is
similar to "care". The more usual (but not universal) American
pronunciation is identical with "cur" (a mongrel dog!) and is seldom
heard in Scotland.

3.Some authorities mention 1490
as the date, and Ferniehirst may well have been built in several stages, as
many other castles were.

4.There is some doubt as to
whether the original Ferniehirst was built by Sir Thomas or by his
father-in-law, Thomas Kerr of Kersheugh. It may have been a joint enterprise.

5.The date of his death
is sometimes given as 1524, but D.N.B. and "The Scots on 1545. peerage" agree

6.The rout of Solway Moss
(1542) was arguably even worse. The Scots suffered casualties on much the same
scale as Flodden, mainly drowned rather than killed in action, but also
including a large number of prisoners who had to be ransomed, thus ruining
their families. At Flodden, honour at least was saved, those who were not
slain withdrew in good order, and there were enough of them left to dissuade
the English from launching a full-scale invasion.

7.This is now known as Mary
Queen of Scots’ House, and is one of the principal sights of the town. The
Queen spent some weeks there convalescing from pneumonia, which she had caught
on the long ride to Hermitage Castle, Bothwell’s stronghold near
Newcastleton. While the house was being built (and before her illness) she
stayed at the Spread Eagle in Jedburgh High Street. which is a few months
older.

8.The bothy where she was
concealed belonged to "Jock o’ the Side" who had promised to
protect her against his fellow-outlaws; one of these, however. Black Ormiston,
robbed her as soon as Jock and Northumberland himself were both away.

9. .Sir
Thomas Kerr’s granddaughter, Lady Anne Can, the only daughter of James’
favourite, married a later Earl of Bedford and the subsequent Dukes of Bedford
were descended from her.

10.James VI and I wrote several
books, and was probably the first to guess at a link between smoking (a new
habit, to which he greatly objected) and cancer; this link was only confirmed
by medical research some 350 years later. He gave the impetus to the
translation of the Authorised Version of the Bible, which is dedicated to him,
frequently attended meetings of the committee in charge of this work, and may
have translated several of the Psalms.

11.She had previously been
married to the Earl of Essex, but had obtained a divorce from him on the
grounds that "he was impotent with no woman except her".

12.There
is some disagreement among the authorities as to how the Lords Jedburgh should
be numbered, due to the fact that not all those who were entitled to the title
in fact used it.

13.George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, was James’ favourite after Robert Can; he Was
English, and jealous of the King’s Scottish cronies, and Maxwell evidently
thought the new favourite would do something for him, if he got rid of the old
favourite’s cousin. However, Maxwell was killed in the duel; Buckingham Was
assassinated a few years later, and Ancram outlived them both by a Whole
geneation.

14.Scotland and England were
still two kingdoms, though with only one King (Austria and Hungary had a
similar relationship until 1918). Charles I was therefore crowned King of
England in Westminster Abbey (1625) and King of Scots at Scone. Charles II,
his eldest son, was also crowned at Scone (1650) ten years before his English
coronation. This was the last Scottish coronation as James VII & II did
not feel it safe to come to this country during his brief reign, and James
VIII and Ill (otherwise known as the ‘Old Pretender’) was never crowned,
though he visited Scotland briefly in 1715-16.

15.Incorrectly described as an
"execution" in most history books. It was murder, because the King’s
"trial" was itself illegal. In the first place the King could not
lawfully be "fried" by anyone; secondly if he could have been tried,
the House of Lords would have been the only competent body for that purpose;
thirdly he was "fried" for an "offence" which was
non-existent at the time when he was alleged to have committed it (i.e. making
war on his own people), and finally the "judges" had already decided
the outcome in advance. Those of them who were still alive at the Restoration
were themselves fried and executed for treason.

15a.The 4th Marquis fought in
Cumberland’s army at Culloden. His brother, Lord Robert Kerr, was the only
officer killed on the "Hanoverian" or "English" side at
Culloden.

16.The present Earl, however,
seldom uses his title, and prefers to be known as "Mr" Ancram or
"Michael Ancram", a habit he acquired while practising as an
advocate in the Scottish Courts. Scottish Judges have the title of
"Lord" with their surname or a territorial designation (though they
do not sit in the House of Lords), and it would therefore be confusing for an
advocate to be referred to in the same way during a frial.

17.For those who are unfamiliar
with Scottish administrative arrangements it should be explained that, while
Scotland and England form part of the same State, the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Northern Ireland, various subjects which in England come under
different Cabinet Ministers (Home Secretary, Secretary of State for Education
and Science, Minister of Housing. Health, etc.) are in Scotland all placed
under the authority of the Scottish Office, headed by the Secretary of State
for Scotland. In the nineteenth century he was often a peer; today he is
always an MP representing a Scottish constituency, assisted by a team of
Junior Ministers, some of whom are MPs while others are peers. But there is,
only one Foreign Secretary and only one Secretary of State for Defence.

18.Robert Earl of Ancram was a
great friend of the poet John Donne who left him his portrait "painted in
shadows"

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